I'm Not My Mother
by Bunny Soshi
Summary: Intent on having Danny's DNA for ulterior motives, Vlad believes no method involved in achieving it is too illogical or dangerous. As far as morals go... what morals? Mentions DxS if you squint. Pompous Pep. Oneshot/drabble.


A/N: I am definitely not sure where this is going or what it's meant to be. As far as I can tell it's a ridiculously long drabble. Also, FFnet's Doc Manager is a butt. A really huge, frozen, non-uploading butt. :'( I have no idea what the heck is going on in Vlad's cat's mind, but I suppose she's a crazy little cynic. That's what happens when you live with Vlad. :D

x_x_x_x_x

_I'm not my mother._

x_x_x_x_x

"Meow."

A snow white long-haired Persian with a silver-tipped tail meowed loudly, gently scratching at the finely polished surface of the cedar cupboard that contained her dinner. If only her paws could find some way to open the cabinet and reach for the canned food inside, then successfully remove its contents from the metal canned packaging. This was an outrage- not only did her owner forget to feed her a much anticipated late-afternoon snack, but to be late for providing her dinner as well? The _nerve_ of some people did truly astound her. Her radiant golden orbs flickered in annoyance as she meowed loudly while her stomach rumbled in displeasure, hearing the tapping of footsteps increasing in volume.

"I'm terribly sorry my dear," her owner frowned as he walked towards her with a brisk pace, clad in an expensive suit that reeked of wealth. "I had completely lost track of time. You'll forgive me, won't you, Maddie?"

A threatening hiss was the only response. To say that Maddie was displeased would be an understatement. Her owner had not been up to par with her standards for a few weeks now; just yesterday, he had forgotten to replace the contents of her litter box and needless to say she extracted her revenge by marking one of his bookshelves. Being of a long-haired species, she also needed to be groomed several times a day, to which her owner had neglected multiple times recently throughout the week. She understood that her owner had duties to attend to; after all, it wasn't a walk in the park to maintain high ratings as a mayor and to overlook companies that made him a billionaire, but this was simply ridiculous. She was supposed to be his first priority, clearly because she was an all-important feline and he was just a human, regardless of status, and that's just how the gears turned in her mind.

Vlad Masters sighed apologetically and began to scratch his cat (though if anyone were ever to ask, he would claim that she belonged to his sister) behind the ears. He opened the cabinet that Maddie was pawing at just moments ago and took out the small can of salmon as well as a bag of dry seafood. After mixing the two, he poured the combination into her food bowl and filled her water bowl, watching the cat ravenously sprint towards the meal.

"I forgot to give you an afternoon snack, didn't I?" His question was rhetorical, as he took a glance at the green tea that he had prepared in the early afternoon and dumped its contents in the sink. He had never been fond of cold tea. _Or coffee _he added in his head as he took a seat in his favorite high-backed armchair that was decorated with two snakes with emeralds for eyes. The billionaire sighed; while it was true that he felt a slight twinge of contrition for neglecting to properly take care of Maddie, he certainly did not feel anything close to remorse concerning the activities that had preoccupied his time.

"My most sincere apologies...but it's perfect, my dear," he smirked, leaning back into the seat, his elbows on the armrests. He placed his hands together as if in thought; it really was perfect. After a whole year of the cat and mouse chase, after a whole year of his inability to actively capture and destroy his old college "buddy," after a whole year of actively watching as the woman he loved live happily with a husband that had transformed him into a sort of a recluse...he had accomplished something beneficial to his position in this little game they were involved in. After all too many failed attempts at reconstructing a dear family of his own to be complacent with and being frustrated at the lack of high-definition imaging for some of his holograms, he had achieved an important, if incomplete, makeshift piece on his side of the chess board.

"He has a blank state of mind at the moment, as I have yet to implement memories," Vlad told Maddie, as if she was completely familiar with everything that went through his head (and she was, in some sense). "There are so many choices. Should he be a child of my blood and relation to the woman I have a great affection for? Should he be a distant relative who yearned for my attention and residence area after his house had been ominously obliterated? Should he be a disillusioned version of the original under the impression that everyone he had held dear to him perished into non-existence, or a parallel dimension of no return?"

If Maddie was listening, she surely did not show it. She didn't think that canned food from the pet store ever tasted so heavenly. Of course, she was still rather upset with Vlad that she had not been fed a proper dinner of steamed salmon with sauteed almond-crusted potatoes and yams in an atrociously long period of time.

"Theoretically," Vlad continued, lost in his musings and half-completed trains of thought, "he can turn half-ghost and display ghostly abilities outside of transformation too, just like Daniel. It should be a stable form, my dear. I've learned from my various past blunders with those insignificant experiments back in my Wisconsin estate. A simple miscalculation in the proper ectoplasm levels of the sample lead to the previous ones to deform, but I have achieved the perfect combination now."

Maddie looked up from her empty bowls and trotted towards the large armchair to rest on Vlad's lap, mindlessly wondering if the man knew that she did not particularly have any interest in his villainous scheming. Just how many failed attempts will the apparently dense man have to endure until he realizes that he was incapable of winning the affection of a married woman and her son? How many elaborate schemes must he plot to destroy a "bumbling old fool" as he had put it, before he realizes that the cold-blooded way of clawing someone's eyes out is the simplest and most effective method? She was honestly tired of all his rambling, although she had to admit that it was amusing to watch the usually calm mayor's face light up in glee when speaking of his plots and trickery.

She curled up, her head resting softly between her paws, with full intention of taking a nap now that her belly was filled and appetite was satisfied. Her owner apparently had other plans as he continued to ramble about his latest experimental voyages in that lab of his.

"My sweet Maddie," Vlad petted the cat, gazing down at the animal with the slightest hint of admiration. "Soon, I will not be the only one who will reside here with us. I'm sure you'll take a liking to Daniel, he's such a pleasant and clever child."

He paused, a nearly inconspicuous frown forming on his features.

"As soon as I obtain his mid-morph DNA," he sighed, shaking his head and placing his hands over his face to Maddie's discomfort. "It's ironic, isn't it? That was the vital missing piece of my last attempt at this experiment, and the missing piece that caused a chain reaction of events that cost me much more than several weeks of research. "

Maddie meowed, rolling her eyes. Was it not evident to this human that all she wanted to do at the moment was take her long-awaited nap? She supposed she would tolerate his incompetence to learn of her desires and listen to him with a miniscule amount of enthusiasm, since he did provide her with a luxurious territorial area (three entire rooms in the mansion) compared with the close-minded buffoons that held her captive in the pet store whom were intent on placing her in a container rated in the negatives on the comfort scale.

"Oh, but of course I have a plan. I even have a plan to alleviate attention from my plan." He continued, a small smirk forming along the edges of his lips. It was an ingenuous idea that had struck him after pondering a good chunk of time on how to obtain that final vital piece of information. It would be simple to grab the boy's DNA; blast him and snatch a bit of his blood, or catch him off-guard and grab a few strands of those raven locks in transformation. The difficult part was the cover-up plot, the device to distract the boy from his plans, for he had attempted cloning before and young Daniel definitely become suspicious if he were to go through with any of the ideas to grab the transformation information. Being the brilliant mastermind that he was, he had derived the perfect scheme- the flawless, impeccable plan that would not only be a form of diverting attention but also destroying the disobedient halfa's self-confidence in the process (to which, he had hoped, would persuade the boy crawl to him). The idea was not practical and certainly far from logical, but it would have to do since his sense of morals were borderline non-existent. "And this time, it will not fail."

If cats could grin, Maddie certainly would have done so.

x_x_x_x_x

Sam Manson frowned with an intensity that would rival the most aggravated participant of Skulk and Lurk late-night readings. Classes were over for the day, and she had a (mostly) homework-free, movie-filled weekend to look forward to with her two best friends. The latest installation of Dead Teacher had hit the cinema and there had been no threatening ghost sightings of late. Her parents did not even attempt to force her to wear a disgusting frilly pink dress in the morning either, but her expression was a sour grape.

It all had to do with the stupid letter that Danny had found in his locker after lunch when they were going to fetch their reading material for English. A crisp, white envelope had rested on top of Danny's books, with his first name written in elegant cursive script, the kind where the capitalized letter was superfluous with small decorative detail and difficult to make out. He had taken it with a quizzical expression on his face which Sam could understand, wondering who it was from since no one paid any attention to the invisibles.

Her initial speculation was that one of the teachers slipped it into his locker for a detention or something, as none of them were aware that ghost-hunting was the reason of lateness (and skipping) to multiple classes throughout the day. But, she reasoned, said teacher would just announce a request for an audience with the student over the intercom instead of going through the hassle of finding the student's locker. She suspected that the locker records hadn't been updated in years.

Her second guess was that the letter was an invitation to some dumb party from a certain shallow person that sat within her vicinity in (to her disdain) a majority of her classes. She was thinking of a certain tan-skinned girl decked in an obscenely illegal amount of pink, slipping letters into A-lister's lockers and grimaced immediately at the image. The ever-so-popular Paulina had not given up on inviting Danny to all of her get-togethers, intent that as long as Sam's best friend was there, the ghost boy would show up as well. Sam thought it would be ironically pleasing to see the expression on the girl's face if she ever found out about Danny's double life.

_However._..Paulina could not have been the person to slip the letter in Danny's locker. He had made it clear that he was stuck to his best friends to the hip with hot-glue gun, so she always invited them as well. Unless she was pulling something up her sleeve (not that Sam would put it behind the obnoxious girl to do so), and there was a valid explanation behind why Sam and Tucker did not find anything unusual in their respective lockers, that option was eliminated.

She watched lazily as the remainder of the class began to file in, each student dreading their lives for the next forty-five minutes of pure boredom inflicted by one Mr. Lancer. He even knew how to turn satires and comedies into methods of torture by making everything in his lectures to sound as bland and dry as possible.

She glanced over at Tucker, who was (as always) with his eyes glued to the PDA that he discreetly held under the desk. He only removed himself from the three-inch screen to glance at Paulina and Star when the two girls entered the room, but upon seeing their pot-bellied teacher he hastily turned his attention back to the piece of technology. She had to suppress a grin at her friend's antics.

She turned to her left to glance at Danny, her object of affection since as long as she could remember (sometime in the years of early grade school), and found herself cross her arms involuntarily as if she had witnessed a young child with a hand in the cookie jar.

Sam knew exactly what the dreaded letter was from the moment Danny opened the envelope and smiled. _Smiled_! No one ever smiled in Mr. Lancer's class, with the exception of Dash Baxter's occasional grin when shooting spitballs at Danny's head. All of the students were too busy dying from utter boredom and exhaustion from being bored.

This could only mean one thing; someone had a secret admirer.

Her amethyst eyes narrowed, taking a glance at the only girl that her friend had been interested in that wasn't the shallow princess of popularity: Valerie Grey. Months ago, the girl had admitted to being interested in her friend, _her _friend. Sam didn't trust the ghost-hunter to say the least. She was worried that Danny would do something irrational like respond to Valerie's subtle yet effective advances like the letter she slipped in his locker and start going steady with the ghost-hunter and neglect their friendship and end up revealing his secret and-

_Calm yourself, Sam Manson. _

Maybe she was over-thinking. It could have been any girl, after all. It might even have been Tucker (although she strongly doubted this option) pulling a prank on Danny or some kid's twisted sense of humor. Repeating that like a mantra in her head, she began to open her textbook to the seventeenth chapter and pretend to be fascinated by the dead authors of the early late-nineteenth century.

x_x_x_x_x

"Tucker, if this is a joke, it's not funny." Sam reprimanded after four entire days of watching Danny sit throughout his classes with a lopsided grin plastered to his face, writing what she presumed was not the overbearingly bland in-class essay, but a response to his recipient. It was odd; it seemed like the person sending him these...infernal messages of understanding and affection was not only competing with her, but also following him in a stalker-like sense. Of course he was too clueless to see it (they had dubbed him Clueless One with a good reason), but Sam had easily caught on.

The person he had been conversing with had taken his response out of his locker after every period and slip a new note at the beginning of the next, regardless of what class he had and what day of the week it was. Someone had to be hanging around Danny a lot in order to do so, and become very familiar with his schedule (and locker combination). There did not seem to be anyone outside of the trio that met the description.

"It's not me," Tucker shrugged, honestly not seeing what the big deal was about Danny having a secret admirer, pen pal, or whatever she wanted to call it. "I don't have the spare change to buy all those fancy envelopes and gifts. I still have two more payments on this baby," he gestured to his PDA.

"Yeah, you're right," Sam sighed, thoroughly confused. Whoever had been sending him the letters had to be spending a pretty penny on (non-recycled) high-quality envelopes with custom-made designs, as well as the small gifts that he had received (a box of his favorite milk chocolate truffles, his favorite scented candles of vanilla peppermint, a miniature collector's edition model of a spaceship, and a silver custom-made analog wrist watch with his initials on the side). A gift for each passing day. It appeared that someone was buying Danny's attention from right under her nose and she didn't like it one bit.

Sam understood that someone was taunting her by playing with fire. Perhaps that someone did not understand that the little loser goth girl was loaded with the big bucks as well and would not hesitate to fight back. She was ready for some vengeance for what she suspected was the taunting of her lack of relationship status with her friend. She had her black lighter lid uncapped, a fierce grip on the tank, and ready to push the simple button that would ignite an all-out war for Danny's interest.

She watched; amethyst eyes wandering to every single member of the female population at Casper High in-between classes and during their breaks. It would be so simple to discover the A-lister who was messing with her friend, under the presumption that they were the only social group that had the capability to afford a custom-made watch for a practical joke.

She grimaced.

Perhaps she wasn't giving Danny enough credit; was he incapable of having a girl genuinely enjoy conversing with him? Was the only reason he was receiving these letters and gifts the cause of a cruel trick to mess with his emotions?

Prank or not, and she presumed not due to the dedication and serious attention to detail in the regal presentation of the letters, Sam knew for sure that there was competition headed her way and she didn't like it one bit. Her eyes glared deadly poison-laced daggers at the back of a certain shallow girl's head. Said girl was talking loudly to her blond equally-as-shallow-if-not-maybe-more friend.

"Sam, what's up?" Tucker asked her, snapping her from her trance that was filled with suspicion and predetermined vengeance. "You haven't touched your grass tree plant thing yet."

"It's not a grass tree plant thing" Sam growled, but was secretly thankful for that familiar sense of normalcy. She had been feeling on the edge ever since she saw the crisp, white letter in Danny's hand in English class, which was her justification for all of the times she had lingered around for an extra few moments by his locker, hoping to peek at the contents of the letter (which Danny refused to share the contents of). The familiarity of Tucker's statement was almost welcoming, even though she had held disdain for his inability to recognize the basic vegetables of an ultra recyclo-vegetarian. "They're called spinach leaves."

"It has the word leaves in it," Tucker pointed out.

Danny couldn't help but agree.

x_x_x_x_x

"Ectoplasm levels stable...check. Memory implementation progressing...check." One extremely preoccupied Vlad Masters went over his digital checklist for the third time. He would not fail; he had taken all of the precautions of whenever that silly boy Daniel would triumph him during their battles at his own estate should tonight's expedition result in another blunder. All of those past miscalculations were ridiculous; it seemed as if fate, luck, and a mixture of trickery had aided the young phantom wherever he went.

He recalled the first time their eyes had met. Although he was initially displeased by resemblance the boy had with his blasted father in terms of face structure, hair color, and ear shape from the helix down to the lobe, he was enchanted by the similarities between their son and the woman of his dreams. Daniel had her captivating eyes that seemed to take the billionaire's breath away upon gazing into them. He had her perfect slightly upturned nose, that caused envy in others who were not as fortunate in the gene pool. He had her charming smile that appeared to have a calming affect on those within a ten-foot radius. He had her intelligence, bravery, modesty, and much more; it was as if Daniel was an obtainable reincarnation of the woman he had grown so fond over (presuming that he was unable to guide the married woman away from her mindless husband). It was as if Daniel had an immediate VIP reservation to his limited group of extremely-favorable-associates-that-would-be-nice-if-said-associates-became-something-more-than-associates-eventually, with the only other member of said group being Maddie Fenton. It was as if Daniel had introduced the concept of love to him from the puppy-filled beginning.

His expression was forlorn with the fragments of memory dancing in his head, reminding him of his mistakes and inabilities.

He had been careless, and his carelessness had cost him dearly.

There was no other explanation for it; if he had devised the cubicle for the boy to be contained in to not have an evident release button (curse that blasted dairy king to a butter biscuit-filled hell), there would have been no interference with his plans. They would not have been like two unfinished porcelain dolls that have been thrown to the ground by a twisted fate and commanded to declare oneself hero and villain in a perpetual conflict. Perhaps if he had phrased his intentions differently, he would have the boy at his beck and call. If he had told Daniel that he would be there to aid in handling ghost powers and discreetly plotting the demise of biological father while enhancing the boy's relationship with the mother so that she would ditch the blundering idiot...perhaps he would not be as broken as he was now. He had money, fame, and fortune; but it felt meaningless and empty without someone to share it with, whether that someone was a lover or a son.

He recalled their other encounters; the brilliant instance where he had manipulated Maddie and Daniel to stay over in one of his many luxurious vacation homes. The Plasmius Maximus had worked in his disfavor, as did his eagerness to accept his mother's offered hand without second thought. The ghost zone incidents, the pranks concerning his mayoral status... the failure of all of those had resulted from his inability to be above one-hundred percent sure that the gears are turning as he planned them as well as the interference of Daniel.

Daniel.

Vlad wondered what should happen to the boy if luck never graced his side. The boy had allowed himself to become overconfident and cocky in ghost battles; not that Daniel was compensating for his lack of strength, but one day he would realize that most of the time, it was pure luck saving his behind from a potentially gruesome transition to becoming a full ghost. That's why Vlad was there- to keep the boy on his toes and to discreetly teach him invaluable information as if their relationship ran deeper than the occasional witty banter.

Pondering something along the lines of having an obedient Danny Phantom hologram to complement the one he had of the flattering woman he adored to accompany him at work (which he had been putting off for several weeks due to this experiment), he was interrupted by a distinct cry of attention.

"Meow."

"Maddie! How did you manage to get through to my lab? It's hidden from prying eyes, I've confirmed that several times with those thick-headed government officials in white." Vlad looked down at his (sister's) cat, picking up the white bundle of fur and taking one last glance at the rows of life-sized test tubes containing miscellaneous forms enveloped in a green liquid.

They were so fragile, each of them containing a potential form of life, but they were each so useless. He had gone through four models today, altering their tolerance to oxygen and physical objects by a small fraction of a percent. One of the samples spontaneously combusted while the other three disintegrated to ectoplasmic residue upon physical interaction of any sort.

There was still a lot of work to be done before he could securely lock the attributes on his prized experiment, and one of which of his largest conundrums was the question of why the alterations between forming a different elemental core for his subject's phantom half would determine percentage of the ghost's gender changing. He had also analyzed the effects of an ice core and tweaked the levels of access towards the source of energy, and even replaced spectulated the results with a fire core; the results were astonishingly atypical. It appeared that the power level of the core and the allowed access to the ectoplasmic being surrounding it had a colossal effect on the ghost's appearance.

"Meow." Maddie was having none of this. She could not believe that her owner had forgotten to call in Anna today. Anna was the red lady (she was always adorned in that color scheme of the brightest primary hue) who usually visited semi-weekly upon request to groom her snow-white fur to perfection and trimmed her claws in a fashion that left them shining to the extent where the stars would be envious.

It had to have been at least a week since her last session.

On top of everything, her stomach growled due to a certain somebody's recent habit of staying cooped up in that creepy place he called a research lab.

Vlad sighed and began to phase through the laboratory in the general direction of the kitchen, realizing that he had yet to consume anything that day and it was a matter of time before his (sister's) cat would decide to put those claws to use. He would hope that his expensive silk draperies directly imported from London were sparred. "I suppose it is time for your late-afternoon snack."

"Meow."

x_x_x_x_x

Danny opened his locker to see that his previous letter had disappeared and replaced with a beige envelope that was soft and leathery to his touch, adorned with a lacy robin's egg blue ribbon. The exchanges of letters had already been happening for a month, although his heart still fluttered at the sight of the stationary resting upon his textbooks. He carefully opened the envelope, careful not to create any creases or tears in the presumably expensive paper, and noticed that something metallic had fallen out.

The item was a bracelet; it felt heavy in his palm, nothing like the cheap fake accessories that Sam's least favorite store carried. It was a silver chain bracelet with two ornaments- one silver star with a swirl of black and white in the middle, and the letter 'V' in a font that appeared regal and elegant. What surprised him was that the base of the letter was green and three tips of the 'V' carried a thin golden lining. It was oddly familiar, but Danny dismissed it as something similar he had probably seen in the ghost zone or something.

_I am disheartened to hear of your misfortunes with Dash Baxter_, the letter read._ I do hope some coincidence of the violent sort befalls him. My schedule is suiting me fine, how are your studies? I have included in this letter a bracelet. Now, before you are to rant about how "feminine" bracelets are, I'll have you know that these bands are quite enjoyable to admire. It is composed of a mixture of 75% platinum and 24.5% pure silver with 0.5% mixture for color variations; it's a matching pair to the one I am currently wearing. _

_I shall take this time to remind you that your writing is as articulate as ever. Addressing your last question, I do hope that we are able to meet in person as you too are an enjoyable person to converse with, but before the option is considered, allow me ask you something. You are the apple of my eye, but who do you cherish most in your heart? –V _

Danny stared at the paper, slightly amused and fearing for his well being. Dash was found in the boy's bathroom during lunch whimpering from a dislocated shoulder and a black eye. He had mumbled something about a freaky ghost, to which Danny felt bad because he was not there to stop the ghost although his ghost sense did not register anything, but he was pleased that he didn't have to put up with any bullying from the jock for a while (hospitalization for a dislocated shoulder? Oh, please).

He wondered who exactly it was he was conversing with as he ripped a piece of loose-leaf from his notebook and a pencil. _Funny you should mention that_, he wrote, _Dash was found hurt in the bathroom today, which I'm sure you've heard. Everyone's making a big fuss about it. He said something about a ghost but I don't know. I kinda felt bad I didn't stop the ghost or something. Being the son of ghost-hunters kinda does that to you. It's weird. _

He paused for a moment, lightly tapping his chin with the eraser of his pencil. Although he had a sense of respect and admiration for whoever was writing to him (and bewilderment as to his this person found out his locker combination to keep placing letters into his locker and reading his own responses), there was no way he was going to let the recipient know of his ghost-hunting.

_You know a lot about who I am…but who are you? _He wrote, hesitant. It couldn't possibly be Valerie or any girl he knew, because the writing style was almost formal as if their interchanges were like a mandatory discussion during a business trip of sorts. Her writing was, anyway. She was probably a senior or something. It felt nice, though, to be appreciated in a form that wasn't the hero of Amity Park, but as the clumsy kid who was banned from touching fragile equipment and landed in detention for lateness occurrences too many times to count. It felt _good_ not to be liked as the person who saved lives on a daily basis from stopping malevolent specters that terrorized the town, but as the C-student who was flunking English but held a passion for astronomy. He glanced down at the last line of the letter and felt an involuntary blush creep its way to his face.

_Uhh, my grades are okay. Yeah._ He continued, hoping he didn't seem like a total idiot although he knew that his beliefs never turned out in his favor. _And- _

"Hurry up dude," he heard Tucker remind him, knowing that the techno-geek had finished grabbing the reading material from his locker and was near due to the furious tapping of keys on the PDA. "We're going to be late."

Danny hoped his scrawl was somewhat legible as he finished._ Thanks I guess? _

_You're pretty cool to write to. Uh. I guess I love whoever loves me. It's only fair I give people a chance right? -D _

"I know," he replied, grabbing the books and closing the locker, stuffing the bracelet into his jeans pocket, hoping that they managed to arrive to class before the ring of the late bell.

x_x_x_x_x

"Later guys," Danny Fenton waved farewell towards his two best friends as they each headed for their respective homes. It was getting past the hour that fifteen-year-olds should be casually hanging outside, and he had a curfew to make. No doubt Sam's mother would pin the blame of her daughter's lateness coming home on him again, and the thought alone made him groan. It wasn't his fault that they spent a good hour on a wild goose chase for a distraught Kitten who was suffering from yet another emotion-wracked argument with her on-and-off boyfriend.

He stretched his arms and yawned, briefly enjoying the complacency of the serene setting of flashing stars vivid in the night sky, before remembering that he had an essay on the importance of literature in the mid-seventeenth century due tomorrow. Crud. Finally a night where he might be home on time, and instead of getting a good night's rest (under the unlikely assumption that no ghosts would ambush him in the wee hours of the morning), he had to stay up doing some stupid essay about dead people that wasn't going to be beneficial to anyone's health or knowledge. Couldn't Mr. Lancer tell that the entire class was bored to death by his lecture and half of said class was asleep?

A sudden chill interrupted his train of thought about his detention-happy English teacher as a wisp of blue escaped Danny's mouth. He picked up the pace and ran to the nearest alleyway to transform into Amity Park's unrecognized ghost-fighting hero, realizing that perhaps he would not make curfew tonight either and return home to angry parents.

He caught sight of the ghost form of the mayor of Amity Park flying casually, _too casually_, towards the general direction of his house. Knowing that the bitter man had the intent to try something funny like try to bring about his father's demise or capture his mother because he was a fruit loop like that, Danny followed the blue vampire-like ghost without second thought.

He became invisible and flew ahead of the other halfa, stopping in front of him and making his presence known. He was hoping for something along the lines of the element of surprise, but the familiar "one step ahead of you" look placed on Vlad's face revealed that his arrival was not unexpected.

"Plasmius," he growled. "What do you want?"

"Daniel, I'm hurt. Is that really how you greet an old friend?" The addressed man mocked with a distressed voice.

"You're flying towards my house. I know you're up to something." Danny glared, knowing that Vlad would deny that. But it was true; the older halfa was always up to something, even when there was no evidence. Danny wasn't paranoid, he had convinced himself, and just extremely cautious with what he was dealing with.

"Must I always be, as you so eloquently phrased it, 'up to something?"

"Yeah, because you're a fruit loop. What are you up to?" He demanded.

"Do you honestly believe that I would suddenly metamorphose into Technus and initiate a long-winded monologue about my prowess in the field of technology and all of my plans to spill them to you out of all people?"

"Umm…no." Danny had to admit that no self-respecting villain would do so, and Vlad certainly was self-respecting (with a touch of narcissism).

"I am simply having an evening fly around the area, little badger. Surely that is the behavior of a good mayor?" Vlad asked smugly, crossing his arms before dodging an ecto-blast that nearly missed his head.

"You're up to something!" If there was something that irritated him about Vlad more than the fact his fruit loopiness just kept invading his personal privacy (he had seen more cameras than he could count inconspicuously lying about in his room which he had finally noticed when his mom made him clean it), it was the way he was never blunt about anything (except for when shouting to the skies that he wanted Jack Fenton's ultimate demise and Maddie's hand in matrimonial ceremony). He would evade questions and turn conversations to his favor, like the skilled mastermind he was, and it bothered Danny to no end.

Being an aggravated teenager, his only resolution to alleviating said exasperation was to shoot ecto-blasts at the other ghost (and the fact that Vlad dodged the blast did not do anything to satisfy him). Although ghosts were interfering with his schoolwork negatively, fighting them was a wonderful source of some common misplaced aggression.

"Nonsense, Daniel. I don't want to fight you," Vlad dodged another ecto-blast. "But if you insist…" he duplicated himself into four copies, enjoying the exasperated look on the other's face. If the hidden surveillance cameras (oh, he had them installed by the dozens) were of any evidence, the boy had been attempting duplication from when they first met and was still unable to grasp the simple concept. The clones surrounded the young phantom at close proximity, and one flew in for attack.

"I won't let you kill my dad or marry my mom or make me your son, Plasmius!" Danny shouted, mentally telling himself to calm down and reach for his recently-harvested ice abilities. He grabbed the incoming duplicate's arm and froze it, rendering it useless, before tossing the copy with more strength than needed to the clone next to it and pushing both of them back.

Seeing the use of cryokinesis made Vlad's blood boil; the young phantom had managed to show an impressive control over his ice core abilities. He could shoot arctic beams at opponents, cultivating his power source to an independent form. Ever since Vlad had discovered that he had an elemental core (ironically opposite of the young boy's element), the only thing he had been successful with its abilities was to give his ecto-blasts an extra power boost (thus illuminating them with a fuchsia pink color). He felt the energy form around his fingers as he clenched his fists and duplicated himself into eight copies, and each clone's hands glowed with the prominent color.

Danny dodged the first two beams and began to counter-attack with his own blasts, but black gloved hands held him by the scruff of his neck and he felt a strong kick to his side that sent him falling towards the nearest rooftop. Catching himself before impact with the cold concrete, he went intangible as six blasts of energy went through his form and caused several dents donning thin wisps of smoke.

"What kind of mayor causes property damage?" He placed a shield against three more hazardous beams aimed toward his general direction. Said shield absorbed the damaged and flickered, before disappearing as Danny shot icicles from his palms.

"What kind of child stays out after curfew?" Vlad retorted, creating a reflecting barrier with minimal effort in front of him, and then slowly flying away from the shield to mock the said child even more. He shot two more blasts, then flew towards the boy with a swiftness that violated speed limits. He landed one punch on Danny, before the young halfa shifted his weight to one hand and went invisible, catching the other off-guard with a sweeping kick.

Vlad was on the ground immediately, but his imitations quickly charged towards the self-proclaimed town hero. Danny dodged a swing to his head and immediately back flipped, kicking the one copy that was following for a shot at him in the head. He was quite the expert at evasion, considering that he always ended up initiating the battles with the offensive and quickly found himself on defense.

He held off the copies- punching, kicking, and shooting projectiles at them until it was a one on one fight. Danny was drained; Vlad usually only split himself into four imitations, and the young halfa had found them to be quite challenging. His energy reserves were low, and if what he believed was one questionably bruised rib, he knew that the other ghost was certainly up to something.

Vlad smirked; everything was according to plan. The older halfa descended down to the rooftop and transformed back into the billionaire mayor that the population unknowingly recognized and respected.

Caught up in a moment of confusion clouding his urge to beat the other half-ghost back to his estate with a ghostly wail, he neglected to turn intangible as a strong hand clenched the silvery white locks on the back of his head. Emerald green eyes were interlocked with cyan.

"Daniel, I will ask you for the last time," Vlad stated, not letting go of Danny, indicating that he was speaking out of business and not the casual witty banter they interchanged with every encounter. "Will you join me? You do not have to renounce your idiot father or bring your dear mother to me; you simply have to say yes."

"Vlad, I've always thought you were a fruit loop, but not stupid until now. You think that I'd join you if you ask me? No way, your intentions are evil!" Danny struggled. He was just about to go intangible before feeling a sharp sting like two electrically charged prongs against his back. He screamed as he experienced a fierce pain coursing through his body, before feeling faint, watching with half-lidded eyes as a pair of rings traveled his body and knew that he had just been affected with the Plasmius Maximus.

"What if I said my intentions have changed, hmm?"

"What are you going to do now, waste me?" Danny crossed his arms in front of his chest with as much strength as he could muster, partially glad that Vlad had released his death grip on his hair out of all places, but mostly terrified of what he was to do. He had no ghost powers for three hours, and stood within the vicinity of a power-hungry ghost who appeared to be nowhere near as exhausted as Danny felt despite their exchange. He braced himself.

He had expected a half-witted retort about his own inexperience, or a crack about how his father was a bumbling fool, or even an ectoplasmic blast to his head for his defiance... but not this.

The first feeling was shock.

Danny Fenton had always thought his arch-nemesis Vlad Masters was a fruit loop, and he was certainly justified considering the pair of lips over his own which belonged to none other than said fruit loop. Danny decided that either he had fainted from exhaustion from the battle and was having a rather interesting albeit terrifying nightmare, or Vlad had really lost it, not that "it" was there in the first place.

The second feeling was pleasure.

Danny could have sworn he had just become a full ghost and his spirit rested somewhere trapped between the clouds. For a man more than twice his age, there was an undeniable softness to his touch that left the young halfa curious and eager to be pressed against them. He found himself involuntarily leaning towards the older man's body when he felt a hand around his waist and fingers lightly embracing the side of his face. It was mesmerizing, how a simple notion could bring him so much bliss and satisfaction, how enchanted and weightless he felt, like he was walking on thin air. When he sensed a tongue glide between his lips, all too anticipating for entrance, a screw finally adjusted itself in his head as he jerked away suddenly. Needless to say he hurriedly pushed Vlad off him and onto the floor for extra measure.

"What do you think you're doing, you freakin' pedophile!" He accused, glaring at the man whose touch he had been willing to succumb to just moments before.

"I am not partaking in anything that you do not approve of." Vlad casually stated, standing to dust himself off and adjusting his cravat ever so slightly, as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred between the two. A wry smirk crept onto his lips._ You are so much like your mother. I'm sure her lips taste like yours. Soft. Succulent. Divine. _"Love you, little badger."

Danny's mind was racing, and each of the hypothetical vehicles in his mind that contained a thread of thought decided to crash each other into Armageddon. Nothing made sense anymore. Vlad was a man of logic and reason. Although he was also a fruit loop and did some irresponsible things, the intentions were always for the older halfa's benefit. What was gained from kissing him? Surely not his father's death or his mother's hand, and definitely not apprenticeship, he mused. Was the purpose to confuse, to lure him into a false sense of security? That certainly was not bound to happen. The billionaire was of no importance to him other than an evident thorn on his side, a thorn that became a parasite, infesting its host like Undergrowth's army of weeds. Sure he was confused and the confusion annoyed him to no end, but he was not about to drop his guard that he held steady against the other for almost a year due to this incident.

"I hate you Vlad." He muttered automatically, giving the mayor a glare. Had he been able to access his ghost powers, his eyes would have turned green and he would have shot a few ecto-blasts as well. Despite being a C student which meant that being stumped was a common occurrence, he still disliked not being able to figure things out, whether it concerned algebraic equations or the motives behind Vlad's actions.

"I never took you for a hypocrite, but I suppose that it is common among the adolescent group these days." The billionaire paid no regard to the boy's previous statement and placed a firm hand on the other's shoulder. He leaned closer to the boy and whispered in his ear, feeling pleased in the shudder that coursed through the boy's body with the words, "Daniel, I do recall that you said it was only fair if you gave people a chance. It appears I was mistaken."

_It's only fair I give people a chance right? _

Danny froze, wondering for a split second if his ice core could make his body literally do just that. Being entrapped as an ice sculpture would definitely feel better than the uncomfortable churning in his stomach and the displeasure of realization in his gut. He glanced at the hand on his shoulder, his eyes slowly trailing from the perfectly manicured fingernails, to his strong knuckles that had dealt a number of blows to his body before. His breath hitched. Time seemed to stop when his vision focused on Vlad's wrist, which was adorned with a silver chain bracelet with two ornaments, star with a swirl of black and white in its center, and his Danny Phantom insignia. There was no mistake about it; that was the companion to the bracelet that seemed to be burning him from its location in his jeans pocket.

"Vlad. I should have known." He cursed silently, refusing to meet the other's eyes and finding the contemporary design of his red and white converses to be the most interesting thing to observe. One of the laces was a little longer on his right shoe, which was also specked with mud and due for some cleansing. He had opened his mouth for a witty retort, but closed it immediately upon finding that the words felt perfectly comfortable where they were; stuck in his throat. After what seemed to be an eternity, he retorted. "Playing with my emotions now? That's low, Vlad…even for you."

"Playing? Oh, children do love their games so." The older man mused, leaning down to and cupping the boy's face with his hands. "Why not give me a chance?"

"This is all part of some scheme isn't it?" He asked hesitantly. The insane idea of his fruit loop of an arch-enemy to be affectionate towards some fifteen-year-old was just that: insane. There was no way that he would willingly believe that the man was sincere. The billionaire was at least his father's age (they had gone to college together after all) with a sadistic streak. Vlad was a manipulator; Valerie was a prime example.

Even if the issues of legality, his sexuality, and sanity was considered into the unbalanced equation, Danny had felt such a connection towards the person who had been sending those letters. Their exchanges had appeared to be heartfelt and genuine. Promising and sincere. Although he should have expected that the only manipulating bastard who would go through the trouble of giving him a fictitious friend, he felt almost disappointed, as if he had just lost someone close like Sam or Tucker.

He knew this was a cover-up for something that was being plotted in his disfavor.

He wasn't stupid despite the beliefs of his parents and teachers when speaking of school performance. It was true that he would never be as perceptive or intelligent as his sister, but she was on an entirely different level of educational competence.

But a small part of him had clung onto the facade, the fake image that Vlad was sincere and truly wanted to be a more active participant in his life. If only Vlad genuinely loved him. He had no qualms about accepting the older man into his life to fill the hollow hole inside his chest, one that had been growing at a dull but steady rate ever since he received his ghostly abilities. It wasn't because of halfa status; it was something that Vlad had sparked in him with every encounter, and Danny still wasn't sure whether or not it was intimidation. If only Vlad was serious. He would be willing to dismiss all his agitations about the older halfa's interest in world domination. He would be willing to overlook the man's tendency to become a sadist that enjoys the misfortunes of others. He would be willing to disregard the billionaire's tendency to wreak havoc upon his family.

He would be willing to forget that the other was a manipulator.

He just wanted acceptance.

"Of course not Daniel. I have grown fond of you over our interchanges. Perhaps now is an excellent time to place our differences behind us and set up an agreement of sorts like the mature adults we are." If Danny had been paying attention to the billionaire's face, he would have seen the brief flash of recognition like a deer in headlights.

Danny looked up at those cyan eyes that were brimming with sincerity. Some had said that eyes were windows to the soul, although he believed that Vlad was the only exception. His eyes were the curtains of the window, effective against those who dared to peer into his barricaded spots of potential weakness. He saw affection seep from those fences, but he recognized something that made the pit of his stomach churn uncomfortably and made him realize that those mesmerizing eyes didn't reflect himself.

He immediately thought about something that Jazz had told him a few weeks ago, a word of precaution when she had discovered one of his letters from snooping around his personal belongings. She had speculated that the sender had been using him and lavishing him with gifts as a method to get close to someone else. At the time she had been concerned for her own well being under the hypothesis that the sender saw Danny as a pawn to her own affection judging from the elegant writing style and carefully selected presents. He had told her not to continue to psycho-analyze every small detail of his life, but now he realized that perhaps there were some truth to his sister's words. The love that burned fiercely inside the man was not for him.

He fought back the threatening drops of salty liquid forming in the corners of his eyes, determined not to show even more proof that his enemy had won this twisted battle in their never ending war. _Just once_, he thought, becoming more bitter with each passing second as a flash of memory reminded him of how Paulina had held utter fascination for his ghostly counterpart and loathed his actual self._ Just once, can't there be anyone who loves me for who I am? _

"No Vlad... I'm not my mother."

Danny pushed the halfa away violently, backing up and running towards the exit at a breakneck speed.

He felt sick. Sick to his stomach, under the weather, green around the gills, and ready to vomit the ketchup and fries he had consumed for dinner.

He had been so happy when he discovered that there was hope in his romantic life, that there was someone out there that respected his interests and enjoyed his words. He had been smiling despite the daily doses of agony that dragged him into a mood to rival Sam's bleak outlook on life. He had been hopeful for every new piece of stationary in his locker, and there was an extra skip to his step upon discovery.

The happiness was replaced by displeasure and disgust; disgust towards Vlad, who had fooled him into thinking that someone cared for him, and disgust towards himself, who had walked right into the ambush. A small part of him held a thread of disgust for the charismatic person his mother was, because he could never be her replacement.

_"Wait Daniel,"_ Vlad had almost said, but refrained himself from doing so. He knew that the young Fenton was right. It was all a ruse, an excellent formulated plan for the boy not to suspect that he was trying to create a clone again to be his perfect half-ghost son as he could not obtain the original. He had the piece he needed, those thin strands of hair caught between the colors of jet black and snow white that emitted a faint, eerie glow. His plan succeeded and that's all that should have mattered, but at the vision of the onyx-haired boy running quickly out of his line of vision, he felt a demon claw at his insides as if reminding him of the emptiness that enveloped him when Maddie had rejected him for the first time.

x_x_x_x_x

"Vladimir Masters, you are a genius." The billionaire congratulated himself, feeling pride swell in his chest. It was done, completed, finished, and successful. He felt a rush of adrenaline pumping through his veins, like the first time that he had constructed an ecto-weapon, and the first time he had succeeded in programming the Maddie hologram.

He stood back to admire his work; the lab walls were stained in various chemical fluids that began to generate ferrous oxide on the metal walls. Several beakers and a spoilt bottle of nitric acid covered a copious amount of the no longer pristine clean floor by his work table. His spectrophotometer had clearly seen better days. It was, for the lack of a more sophisticated word, a mess. But it was a splendid potpourri of ingenious innovation, a cosmopolitan collection of incommensurable works.

Vlad made a mental note to pay a visit to Desiree to commemorate her aid in achieving the necessary materials and to discuss the results of his completed experiment, as he walked towards the array of life-sized test tubes enveloped in ectoplasmic green liquid. Various forms of differently-colored structures resided within them; some were a wispy fluid of the brightest hue of blue, some were disfigured ecto-structures that had been recognizable at one point in their existence, and some resembled bodies more human than ghost.

One such sample contained a young female figure with raven black locks, her startling icy-blue eyes open in a trance-like state, her black-clad body disappearing at her midsection to form a gradient to the liquid she was submerged in. He paid no attention to the incomplete disaster of an experiment that she was; her test container (marked X3DFH2EP75-04) indicated that she was of the third division after all, and therefore exempt from further modifications. The numerous amounts of partially developed figures like her clouded his peripheral vision, and he resolved to set aside a day to recycle all of them into material for his new successes. After all the trouble he had gone through and all the work that he had to compensate for, he was quite sure that compared to the creation of a functioning half-ghost boy, the creation of a human woman would be a slice of delicious red-velvet cheesecake.

He stopped walking, the tapping of his shoes against the marble ceasing to create shrill echoes as well. He had arrived at his destination; the only container that was not filled with various fluids, that held captive a young boy who appeared to be no older than fourteen or fifteen. The black and white jump suit and snow-white hair indicated that the figure inside was none other than Amity Park's town hero, Danny Phantom.

The billionaire hit the large red release button, watching as the bottom of the glass container lifted, exposing the figure to the air around. There was no spontaneous combustion of yet like the previous sample, and he took it as a positive sign. The figure moved its arms and legs with caution, as if testing for maneuverability should anything threatening to its existence occur.

A small seed of doubt planted itself in the back of Vlad's mind; what if eighty ectopower had not been enough to ensure a stable form? What if eighty was too much and would cause his prized sample to disintegrate?

His apprehension was alleviated when the figure stood up without staggering, like a normal human being (or as normal and human as one would percieve when considering a ghost), and walked towards him. X4DFH2EP80-30 opened its eyes; a pair piercing, vivid, emerald green orbs that locked onto his. A smile of recognition danced upon its mouth, as Vlad felt a tugging similarity at the corners of his own lips. He had done it.

He had achieved perfection.

Lithe arms wrapped around his figure, as a head of soft snowy locks pressed against his chest. Vlad slowly placed his arm around the subject, as he saw a blinding ring of white form across its waist. In a brief second, any passerby who dared trespass on the billionaire's private property and managed to discover a way to become intagiable to enter the laboratory would have seen a comforting embrace between their respected mayor and son of the Fenton family. A soft, nearly feminine voice that reminded him of Daniel and Maddie at the same time interrupted the tranquil silence.

"Hello, father."

Vlad pulled back, gazing into the face he could have sworn he saw a few hours prior. There was no mistake; those endless pools of baby blue, the ambrosial slightly upturned nose, the smile that sent a shudder of delight down his spine . No number of holograms could compensate for this.

"Good morning, Daniel."

x_x_x_x_x

A/N: X4DFH2EP80-30 isn't a random letter/number sequence. Props if you can guess what every abbreviation means. I might do a sequel. Thoughts?


End file.
